Flooding

Since Friday, our town has experienced flooding. The Black River crested to 26.4 feet with flood stage being 17 ft. I took some shots of the flooded river which hasn't crested this high since 1926. Our home wasn't affected by the flood, but the river has caused 2 major highways to be shut down.

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This is the Black River.

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This park is located just below the bridge. As you can see, everything is under water.

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Crossing the bridge and approaching Don's Steakhouse and Wal-Mart. They sandbagged the parking lots and so far the water has not entered the buildings.

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This street is located just past Wal-Mart. By Saturday, the water had risen even further inland causing flooding at the intersection.

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This street is located 1 1/2 miles from the bridge. The Police Training Academy is seen in the background. Water completely covered the fields and the only thing visible was the road in some sections.

Wow, Sundial. I am grateful that your home is OK...and also, my heart goes out to those who have not been so fortunate.

Glad you're okay, Sundial!

Karen

been thinking about all you mid-westerners...my parents live outside St Louis :eek: no danger in their neck of the woods but it is apparent to my Mom who can not go anywhere cause everything is a mess!!!

Glad you are ok SD...and hope all the others are doing ok too!!! My heart goes out to all those flooded...water can be both evil and great! Here we are in a drought and talks of water restrictions...no planting beautiful flowers because we can't water :( Thankfully I have taken the drought resistant route in what I have planted...

crazy weather....:confused:

And its all coming to New Orleans! We're watching the river rise and wondering what level of safety "valves" will be opened. There's the bypass to Lake Pontchartrain, the Bonnet Carre ("Bonny Carry") that opens first, and the ultimate - the Morganza Spillway which will divert additional flows down the Atchafalaya (A chaf a lie a, all short "a"). Old Man River keeps wanting to go down the Atchafalaya, and he might get his chance.

Hope your levees hold. Those of us down river are holding our breaths.

Wow, Sundial, those photos are dramatic! Glad you haven't been affected directly, but I'm sure many, many people have. You don't say exactly where you are located. My in-laws are in Ohio and have mentioned scenes like your photos show. They are getting a little seepage in their basement but have everything up on blocks so are okay so far. Like bb says, we are in drought here in NC (tho' it's eased a bit recently thanks to some rains the past month). It seems that everyone either has too much or too little water. :( Hope it will all equalize soon. We'd be happy to take some of it off your hands (but not ALL of it!)

Emily

My house is safe too, but my drive to work was shut down at the Interstate, and the easy access road to my house was closed due to flooding. I work within the levee zone in Valley Park, so we were hoping and praying the levee held. Nothing like wondering if you should or shouldn't pack up an entire office building and send everything to high ground.

If we had received another half day of rain, the river would have backtracked via the creeks all the way to my house, as it was it only made it half way. But everything is going down quickly. Word on weather.com though is that we have more rain the rest of the week.

now that I've actually seen the photos, Wow! :eek: (for some reason, sometimes photos won't load on my work computer, which has high speed, but will load at home on dial-up, go figure)

Since I'm working on a "Flood Damage Reduction" project - don't you just LOVE government speak? Anyway, an urban flooding project... one thing that we have to look at is whether or not structures flood, if it's just streets and parks, it's considered a local problem and not a federal interest - think about whether or not claims will be made on Flood Insurance. My project is in a community where they were stupid enough to allow excavation in the subdivision roads, to build up the land where the homes were built - and now the home owners complain that they're stuck either at home or on the highway after a heavy rain. Home owners yell at local politicians, who beg for help... But since no homes are flooded, not a federal problem - although we can lower water levels because of flooding in adjacent neighborhoods (homes and businesses). The things I've learned in the past few years....

Anyway, I hope the water has crested, and y'all don't have to discover the joys of dealing with Flood claims and FEMA.

And if you're looking at more rain - get things up off the floor, to a second story if at all possible. The ground is saturated, so flooding could be worse. I'll send you some of our sun if it'll help.

I heard about this on the news and wondered about you. I am glad to hear that you aren't flooded at your house. When you say that the river crested, you mean that it is now receding, right?

Keep us posted.

The river is receding and it's left quite a mess for some people. Valley Park's levee did well. Castlewood park still has a lot of water and has been closed for several days. Here's to the predicted rain for this week causing no extra problems and best wishes to New Orleans and company!

Looks like we'll have a bunch of new trash for this year's Operation Clean Stream. :(

We had the flooding in Central Missouri. Lots of students couldn't make it to school because of covered roads, and our neighboring school was closed. I went to KC on Good Friday and by the Gasconade river, there was only one lane open, and then it was completely shut down within a few hours. Kind of weird trying to find a way back home since so many of our roads were closed!

Glad the levee held! I used to live by Valley Mount Ranch when I was growing up, and it's been a while since Valley Park has seen this much water! I think we have pictures somewhere...was it 1982? Just glad your office didn't have to pack up. What a major hassle that would be!

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Hope your levees hold. Those of us down river are holding our breaths.

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It broke yesterday. :( Hwy 67 N and S to Pocahontas were closed to local traffic only. The water had moved north and was spilling over a bridge not too far from Williams Baptist College in Walnut Ridge. The road crew reported 4 feet of water was over the bridge.

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You don't say exactly where you are located.

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I'm in Pocahontas, Emily. And congrats on your new little one. She is absolutely adorable. :)

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My house is safe too, but my drive to work was shut down at the Interstate, and the easy access road to my house was closed due to flooding.

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Liberty, just when we think we're in the clear, they close down another highway. What's bad is we only have 4 ways to come into Pocahontas, and 3 were closed at one time. My friends who work in Walnut Ridge had to drive an hour out of the way to get to their job when it normally takes 20 minutes max. :eek:

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Anyway, I hope the water has crested, and y'all don't have to discover the joys of dealing with Flood claims and FEMA.

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Me too! I dealt with FEMA once before and it was a PITA. I volunteered to work with the displaced Katrina survivors from NOLA who were brought to a Baptist encampment not far from here. It was an eye opening experience working with the fed/state government.

I've wondered about the displaced wildlife. I have heard that a dozen deer were seen on the square of our downtown. 2 had tried to get in our church! One man drowned trying to save his dog.

Rain is in the forecast and please continue to keep the flood victims in your prayers. Some of the communities are completely shut off from receiving any assistance due to the flooding. The Salvation Army mobile disaster trailers are coming in now.

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This neighborhood was just starting to flood on Friday. By Sunday water was in many of the homes.

I really hope people in the affected areas have flood insurance. Home owners WILL NOT cover the claim. They'll cover water damage in a home if it's from a roof leak or a broken pipe, but something like 2-3 houses adjacent to each other, have rising water, that constitutes a flood, and therefore claims would be under flood insurance. For many parts of the country, flood insurance isn't very much.

Please people, if you live in a river/stream valley, and are at ANY risk of flooding, fork out the few bucks and get flood insurance. If you happen to live in the "blow zone" for hurricanes, insurance can equal homeowner's premiums, but then there's no choice in the matter. For what it's worth, NYC and much of the northern Atlantic coast is at risk for hurricanes. Welcome to the blow zone.

Beth, I hope you guys don't get major flooding from our rivers. Keeping my fingers crossed for you.

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This is an overlook that shows how far reaching the flood is. The Black River bridge can be seen in the background.

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Heading north and approaching the bridge. Although the water never came over the bridge, it flooded the lower lying areas, including the Wal-Mart parking lot located adjacent to this bridge.

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This billboard is at least 30 feet above the ground and the water was lapping the bottom edge by Saturday.

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This park was just recently reopened. The water had covered the Century Wall and had covered the sidewalks close to the road. The road was just re-opened to traffic.

I have a rental property near Little Rock. About 3 feet of one corner of a bedroom is located in the 500-year flood plain of a creek that is at least 300 yards away, downhill. As a result, we are required to have flood insurance. $1200 a year! Equal or more than our hazard insurance. It's a joke in this instance. I get hassled about it by the government every year. I don't know how people in actual flood plains get away with not having it.

Karen

You can thank some of those lessons learned after Katrina and Rita. Don't ask my why, but in some parts of New Orleans (the city proper), home owners whose homes were lower in elevation than mine (my neighborhood is rated -3.5 ft) were not, repeat NOT, required to have flood insurance, and many did not. It was very difficult to listen to the poor-little-rich-girl who used to sit in the cube across from mine whine about having 6 ft of water in her house, but they didn't have flood insurance - and her husband is an economist (poor-little-rich-kid too). OK, I'm cranky :mad: this evening for some reason, so I'll stop before I put both feet in my mouth.

Anyway, thanks to lessons learned after the hurricanes of 2005, more areas are being assessed for potential flood hazard, and folks are now being required by their mortgage companies to have flood insurance.

Oh, and better for parks to flood than homes and businesses. Bad for park, but better for houses. And all that green space absorbs the water better than streets and driveways.

Yes, I agree. I wish it had only flooded the park. Unfortunately, homes were flooded because many are situated in vast flat farmlands where the water can't go anywhere. It'll be another 2 days or so before we know the extant of the damage to homes.

Beth, I can't believe many of the NOLA people didn't have flood insurance. :eek: :confused:

In a city with 30% poverty rate it isn't that surprising. What amazed me were the number upper-middle class that didn't have insurance. Something like 60% of the folks in the Lower 9th actually owned their homes, often they inherited them. It's mortgage companies that force you to have flood insurance, so if your house isn't mortgaged, and you're barely getting by, insurance is not your first priority.

Many thanks to the High School and College kids who are giving up their spring breaks to come help rebuild. Met some nice kids from Farmington, NM the other day while taking my dog for a walk - they're staying in a neighborhood church that provides bunk housing for volunteers. One of the boys is on his second trip.

After Katrina, my dad went there with a mobile disaster unit to help prepare meals for the relief workers and the locals. He remembers vividly standing on a street corner, handing out care boxes of non-perishables. A woman walked up with a small child and handed him a small stuffed red heart. Her eyes met his briefly before turning to leave. My dad just stood there, tears rolling down his cheeks.

He was forever changed by that.

Yeah, and I have a warm place in my heart for some CMA (Chrisian Motorcycle Assoc) guys who set up a field kitchen in Chalmette. In the early days after the storm I was working in the area, and when I came back that evening suffering from heat exhaustion, these big burly biker guys brought me in the kitchen, parked me in front of a fan, put a bottle of cold water in one hand, bottle of cold gatorade in the other and made me drink both, gave me a cold cloth for my neck, then told me brownies cured everything and handed me one. Then they offered me hot dinner. Meanwhile I'd been watching shell shocked firefighters from all over come through their line, enjoying their first hot fresh meal in days instead of MREs. The CMA guys didn't ask permission (FEMA or Red Cross) other than the local sheriff - they just moved in. Once the Red Cross found out about the kitchen, they restocked it. They weren't pushy about a message, had little pocket sized Bibles on the buffet line, they were living their faith.

I saw those CWA guys running around too. They didn't seem like the sort to ask permission and there probably wasn't anyone to ask anyway. We had the Salvation Army handing out food and cold soda in our sector too. I never managed to get any of that. Usually because when they stopped by, I was either out rooting around for supplies or in the middle of something else. But, I always knew I had an MRE somewhere with my name on it. Good enough.

I made semi-regular food and water drops to a few families down there. I had to show a few of them how to work an MRE heater and some of the ways you can mix stuff to make it taste better. One poor lady got the Army's version of dirty rice and was utterly appalled.

When you've watched someone pick over what's left of their belongings, or talked to someone who is having to start over with nothing, flood insurance seems pretty cheap.

Puts into perspective the fact that my basement is all wet for unkonwn reasons right now. It's not raining and it was dry this a.m. The plumber's coming tomorrow.j... and since I've loaned my house out it doesn't even *bother* me directly and they're going to cover it ... but there are boxes I'd moved that have gotten wet... I'm afraid some old school files will ahve to go, whih prolly should have gone a long time ago... and Pete just brought me a beer 'cause they think I need it when *he's* hte one just spent an hour hoovering out the muck.
But it's so far from being everything!!!

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Originally Posted by bmccasland

Yeah, and I have a warm place in my heart for some CMA (Chrisian Motorcycle Assoc) guys who set up a field kitchen in Chalmette. In the early days after the storm I was working in the area, and when I came back that evening suffering from heat exhaustion, these big burly biker guys brought me in the kitchen, parked me in front of a fan, put a bottle of cold water in one hand, bottle of cold gatorade in the other and made me drink both, gave me a cold cloth for my neck, then told me brownies cured everything and handed me one. Then they offered me hot dinner. Meanwhile I'd been watching shell shocked firefighters from all over come through their line, enjoying their first hot fresh meal in days instead of MREs. The CMA guys didn't ask permission (FEMA or Red Cross) other than the local sheriff - they just moved in. Once the Red Cross found out about the kitchen, they restocked it. They weren't pushy about a message, had little pocket sized Bibles on the buffet line, they were living their faith.

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What a great story. I have the opportunity to live across the street from a man who is am member of the Christian Motorcycle Association. He is one of the greatest men I have ever met. He get SO EXCITED when they head out for an adventure. Once their group spoke at a church and I had an opportunity to hear their stories. They were people who had experienced horrific childhoods - verbal, physical, and sexual abuse - and later in life had recovered from addictions, scraped themselves up from the bottom of the barrel and went on to help others. Some truly amazing people. Thanks for sharing.

:( One of the major highways was shut down again today because of flooding. The river is now at 22 ft--still well above flood stage. We had rains the last couple days and it didn't help matters. I still can't ride my road or mountain bike at my favorite locations because of the flood.

Anyone have a blueprint for an ark? :o :rolleyes:

Oh, wanted to add, FEMA tried to survey the damage Monday but were rained out. :D Tell me God doesn't have a sense of humor. ;)